I realize that your discussion with your wife has long passed. However, for other people in your situation maybe this can help:

I am a woman who WANTED to stay home with the children. I WANTED to be there... To be available night and day. Its what I wanted my whole life. It's what I thought defined my value as a wife and mother. Oh, how stupid I was!

I was active duty military with a Masters degree and a promising future. I am incredibly intelligent, enjoyed the frustration of social interactions, sought out the answers to complex work-related problems to increase performance and output in the workers... I enjoyed the complexity of life. The riddles... The intelligent interaction and game-playing required to succeed. I thrived on it...

...but I believed I didn't need it and I gave it up for my family. I became a housewife; a full time mother. I gave up my identity to assume the title of "so-and-so's wife" or "mother". I no longer was known as my own person but rather only as an extension of someone else's identity. I was judged as being uneducated and those who didn't know me spoke down to me in the assumption that I was less educated. I no longer had to solve important problems. The problems facing me were reduced to "Tropicana or Minute Maid orange juice", should I pay the bills on the first or the second, can I handle another episode of friggin' Dora? My mind was turning to mush. Play dates were horrendous: mothers talking about little Johnny's poop problems, the everlasting problems with getting tiny Beth into her ballet costume, how to fill up their kids schedules with crappy events so that their entire days were lived in a vehicle taxiing them from one thing to the next... Trying to make them more popular, likable, smart, talented... The mothers wanted clean, perfect, synthetic children. I hated those superficial, crazy, obsessed women! Can we please talk about something more meaningful than how great our kids are? 

I'm not trying to knock mothers who do it (I did it. I'm STILL doing it). I'm glad they are strong enough to give themselves up for the sake of their children. I hated it, though. I still hate it. I feel as though I have lost my usefulness as an adult who contributes to the positive growth of my society. Yes, my children needed me... But they needed me as a whole person and not some fictional fraction of someone who "gave" something up for them. Eventually, I resented them and my husband. I had no friends. I had no use for my intelligence. I had no drive. I became depressed. I hated everyone and everything. 

I thought things would ease up when my kids started school. It didn't. It got worse. I watched them grow and counted the years. They needed me less and less. I couldn't get a job in my field anymore. I was outdated and irrelevant. My social skills were gone. My problem solving was useless. 

The years have consumed me. My oldest is almost 18 and my youngest is almost 15. Neither comes to me for school help because they saw me as just "mommy". They knew I was educated but never saw me using my knowledge and just assumed my education

level was equivalent to a 6th grade child with a learning problem. They come to me for comfort and "mommy problems". 

I would do anything for my kids. At this point, though, I did them and myself a huge disservice by denying them the opportunity to see me as a strong, reliable professional woman in a position of power and responsibility in a working role. I had so much more to teach them about life. There was so much more to ME that they missed out on. 

Time ate me and these years have slid by. I suffered so long only to find time had passed so fast. When they leave I am going to be totally lost. A new job is not unfathomable but the adjustment simply is unimaginable at this point. I'm angry that I cannot be the person I could have been had I kept my career...and I'm SUPPOSED to be comforted by the fact that almost 20 years later I get to START ALL OVER AGAIN!... When HE is thinking of RETIRING?!?! Really? 

I love my children but they needed to see me love myself. They didn't get to see that. They would have gotten more from a daycare environment that provided social interaction and constant stimulation... Problem solving, team building, life experiences. 

Some women can do it. Others? Not so much. Please don't ask anyone, man or woman, to give up themselves for the sake if their children. If you feed them, love them, and give them the best of yourself then they will be fine. A child will adapt and adjust. An adult will become resentful. Your child doesn't need mommy and daddy to be with them ALL THE FRICKING TIME! Let them discover life without your hand on them. Let them find out what happens when they hit little Johnny and no one is around (they get hit back). Let them learn to tell stories around the dinner table about their day. Let them explain how they grew today at school, how they learned to apologize to a new kid, how to make a friend, how to avoid enemies, how to spot enemies, how to handle life situations without you. Let your spouse be who they are, too. Don't let them give themselves up! There IS A PRICE TO PAY... if you're not willing to pay it then please don't ask her to pay it for you.